Stealthy Freire wins third San Remo, Cavendish suffers

Oscar Freire received the crown of Milan-San Remo king for a third time today. The Spaniard kept hidden for the entire day, showing his orange Rabobank colours when it counted, in the final 200 metres.

“You always suffer in a race, above all when you race 300 kilometres. My most difficult moment was the descent on Poggio. [Filippo] Pozzato created a gap and four or five went ahead, I was afraid they would survive,” said Freire.

“My only thought was to find a good position and let the others pull, it was up to them. It was my only chance to try to win.”

“At the bottom of Turchino, like the other day, I had the spokes ripped out of my wheel. I had to do a wheel change, I chased, right in the tunnel I got back to the peloton and there was a crash in the tunnel.

“On the Mànie, I suffered to the top and then I crashed on the descent, so then I went from the front the back, and had to chase again.”

Cavendish suffered from tooth problems this off-season and said that had he been able to start his season two weeks earlier he could have been competitive in today’s race.

The race saw an early escape of three men attack at kilometre 1 and gain up to 21 minutes and 55 seconds. Their gap fell dramatically between the Passo del Turchino and the start of Le Mànie climb.

Cavendish, Andy Schleck (Saxo Bank) and Damiano Cunego (Lampre-Farnese Vini) and many others lost ground to a group of 81 on the descent of Turchino. By the base of Le Mànie, the front three held one minute on the chase and one minute and 50 seconds to the Cavendish group.

Cavendish and the others re-joined the front group after Le Mànie. With the front three back into the fold, it was ‘gruppo compatto’ ahead of the critical part of the race: I Tre Capi, the Cipressa and the Poggio.

Connect with us

Please keep me up to date with special offers and news from Cycling Weekly and other brands within the Time Inc. UK Group by email. You can unsubscribe at any time.

We'd also like to send you special offers and news just by email from other carefully selected companies we think you might like. Your personal details will not be shared with those companies - we send the emails and you can unsubscribe at any time. Please tick here if you are happy to receive these messages.